


always

by laurelsalexis



Category: Riverdale (TV 2017)
Genre: Canon Compliant, F/M, Prompt Fill, everything is sad
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-30
Updated: 2018-04-30
Packaged: 2019-04-30 05:54:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,228
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14490270
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/laurelsalexis/pseuds/laurelsalexis
Summary: F.P. takes the news of Charles well. As well as can be expected, at least.





	always

**Author's Note:**

> Prompt fill from some tumblr drabble thing. 
> 
> #14. “Hey, I’m with you, okay? Always.”

F.P. takes the news of Charles well. As well as can be expected, at least. 

For the most part he keeps to himself and goes about his life. Alice doesn’t call him so he doesn’t call her. She’s back with Hal and he knows all too well what that means. It means the same thing it meant twenty-five years ago and he’s fine with accepting that.  _Mostly_. The ache in his chest over his dead son provides a rather nice distraction. 

He focuses on work, the Serpents, and making sure Jughead doesn’t get into too much trouble. The latter a near impossible task when his son is always out and about doing something. Has no idea what self preservation is and as much as F.P. does want to scold him for it…he can’t. Not when that’s one aspect of his son that is found in him. 

None of the distractions work to stop him from thinking about his son.  _Another son_. One older than Jughead and dead. That’s the most important part of that.  **Dead**. He thinks about the boy he’ll never meet more than times than he count and all it does is make his mood a touch more foul than he desires. He snaps over little things. Enough people write it off as him being the man he was while lost in all the booze that no questions are asked. 

He wishes he was drunk for most of it. 

The worst part of it all is that he doesn’t even blame Alice. He hurts like a bitch but he knows  _why_ she didn’t tell him. He doesn’t know the story of how he died, nor did Alice tell him in their brief conversation in his trailer where she was in hysterics. All he knows is that she is definitely not at fault no matter what happened. She’d never intentionally harm her children. Any of them. 

It’s not until he catches her blonde curls sitting at the bar in the Whyte Wyrm does he even see her again. He swallows and takes a seat next to her. Doesn’t ask what she’s doing there when she should be in her house. Doesn’t speak at all, actually. Not when he doesn’t know what to say. It’s a shift in their relationship and part of him is truly afraid as to what it all means. Too much vulnerability for a man who doesn’t have any to spare. 

The silence is better. 

She downs another drink before she turns and looks at him. The tears in her eyes are impossible to miss and he wishes more than anything he could make her pain go away. He doesn’t think when he wipes her falling tears away. Never could stand to see her cry. He aches in his own way but when he sees her like that, it’s all he can do to help her. 

“I hurt so much, F.P.” It’s barely a whisper but loud enough for him to hear. 

He swallows, scooting so he’s closer, barely still sitting on the bar stool. “It’s okay. It’ll be okay.”

Her gaze falls from him, settling into her lap, where her hands are resting. “Why don’t you hate me?” 

“Hey, I’m with you, okay?” Words spoken so firmly, matter of fact, not leaving any room for her to think otherwise. “Always.”

She nods, wiping her tears away, looking back at him. “Why?”

It’s not a conversation he wants to have in the middle of the bar, even if no one is ever going to say anything. He stands and gestures for her to follow him. They move up the stairs and into the little office. He takes a seat on the couch and she sits next to him. There’s enough personal space so she can turn to look at him, tucking her leg under herself, leaning against the arm of the couch, as if she’s trying to seem smaller. 

He takes a moment to remember the fight he overheard with Hal. Maybe he should have thought harder on it when they were teens, knowing she’d been with him, too. But he didn’t. There’s an acceptance it was Hal’s kid and then seeing Chic made it even more set in his mind how much that kid was a Cooper. Until he’s not Alice’s son in the first place and nothing makes sense. Just Charles. 

It’s so far in the past none of it really matters. Does it? 

“I know you blame yourself,” he starts, trying to find the words, unsure as to where any of this is going, “but you couldn’t have known. Nothing could have been different.” Part of that is a lie but it’s one he’s willing to have them both sit on to ease the pain. “You did what you had to do, Alice, and no one has fucked up more than me.” 

Alice cracks part of a smile at that, daring to look over at him. 

“Is it tragic and fucked up? Hell yeah. But…” As it turns out he really doesn’t know what to say. Not much can be said other than how unbelievably depressing everything is. Saying a lot given it’s  _Riverdale_. 

“It is what it is?” Alice whispers, in a soft and sad voice, swallowing back any more emotion. 

She’s not wrong and he hates it’s that..simple. “Yeah, I guess so.” 

“Would we have kept him?”

“Oh, Alice.” He can sense the road this is heading down and it’s not a good one. “It won’t change anything.”

“Answer the question, F.P.”

“I would have liked to, yeah.” He lets out a long, shaky breath, clasping his hands in his own lap. He cares for Alice so damn much that it’s easy to prioritize her feelings over his own, but his are desperate to come out. He’s been shoving it down since she told him and there’s a dam so ready to break. He blinks a few times, trying to push the tears away, but the way his face falls into nothing but sadness he can’t help himself. “I can’t do this, Alice.”

She sits up on her knees and shuffles the small distance on the couch to him. Her arm moving around him, shifting down so she’s sitting on her legs, chin resting on his shoulder. Her hand finds his as other holds him. “I’m sorry.” 

He leans into her even if he knows he shouldn’t. She should be elsewhere but none of it matters. Not when they are both so lost and distraught in everything. He can see the light hit the diamond of her ring as he tries his best to remain her rock, but in that moment, he needs a rock, too. Not that he asks her of it. That’s unfair. 

The sniffles that come from both of make the emotion all too clear. There’s nothing happy or even peaceful. It’s grief and twenty-five years of lies coming to the surface. It’s everything being said without any words. There’s still so much they need to talk about but for now they settle into this. 

F.P. pulls his hand from hers. He feels the way she stiffens, almost pulls back, before he’s properly holding her hand. It’s everything so he can feel closer to her.

“F.P.?” She murmurs, trying to sound put together, but being anything but. “ _Always_.”

**Author's Note:**

> [tumblr.](http://laurelsalexis.tumblr.com/)


End file.
